College is being sold as a must have, when in fact it is a ‘good education’ that one must have. How one acquires a good education is a whole other issue. If academics were to tell you the truth, it is your paper trail that is most important, not necessarily what you learned. If you don’t believe me, just look at the sexy brilliance Harvard gave to America.
Most kids aren’t even ready for college when they get there, particularly those who are products of government schools. As Freeman reports,
“Another measure of the failure of public education is that almost all institutions of higher education now provide remedial instruction to some of their students. The Southern Regional Education Board surveyed its members in 1986 and found that 60 percent said at least a third of their students needed remedial help. Surveying this evidence of failure among college-bound students, former Reagan administration official Chester E. Finn, Jr., wrote that “surely college ought to transport one’s intellect well beyond factual knowledge and cultural literacy. But it’s hard to add a second story to a house that lacks a solid foundation.”
Yet kids buy into the system. The better perceived the college, the more they can charge. Harvard is therefore better than community college we are told, because community college students don’t usually end up with debt. The more debt you graduate with, the more the government owns you. You must become an immediate producer. You are trapped into the American Dream. The American Dream has now morphed into the American Nightmare, graduates finding that they are now being pimped by the Federal government.
Ironically, kids are forced to become who the government punishes most—the overachiever. Because the kids now need money, and the pimp is going to get his money. The graduates get trapped into productivity, in order to get those loans paid off. But when the loans are done, don’t think the kids are off the track.[18] All that education and hard work just got them off the streets and waiting for the phone to ring.
The call comes when the kids prove that they can produce, and they are assigned wards. One may acquire the shiftless and lazy dude with six kids he won’t take care of, as well as the family of illegals who needs an earner. The government will monitor progress, and assign more wards as the graduates continue trying to get ahead.
The system needs them. College is good, but not necessarily for the students and future taxpayers. The concept of college is not to create thinkers, just earners for the government aristocracy.
There is good news though. Students won’t have to pay for it all. That $50K a year they will pay for their educations will be offset by financial aid.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan visited students at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Virginia and encouraged them to load up on college loans. He told kids that there is [pp] “lots of money out there for you. Be sure to pick the best college, because the best colleges offer the best potential for your future.
We have built a system where Americans now owe more than $875 billion on student loans, which is more than they owe on their credit cards. Yet Obama regulated the banking industry. It hasn’t gone unnoticed on me that Obama hasn’t decided to make burgers from the sacred cow called ‘education.’
Since 1982, the cost of medical care in the United States has gone up over 200 percent, while the cost of college tuition which has gone up by more than 400 percent. Is it any wonder that Obama decided to make the rising cost of healthcare a priority over the rising cost of education?
Approximately two-thirds of all college students graduate with student loans, and the Project on Student Debt estimates that 206,000 Americans graduated from college with more than $40,000 in student loan debt during 2008.
After graduation, these students will be greeted with the most anemic economy in their lives, with unemployment in the stratosphere. It is estimated that there are two million recent college graduates who are currently unemployed. In 1992, America had 5.1 million “underemployed” college graduates. By 2008, there were 17 million “underemployed” college graduates in America.
Perhaps America’s under-employed graduates represent the 317,000 waiters and waitresses who have college degrees. Or perhaps they are part of the nearly 25 percent of retail salespersons who have college degrees? Let’s hope that there is some double-dipping and some of these waitresses and retail persons are part of the 365,000 cashiers who have college degrees. Unfortunately, it is pretty unlikely that there is any overlap with the over 18,000 parking lot attendants with college degrees.
CNN references a survey where a staggering 85 percent of college seniors planned to move back home after graduation last May. Many of these soon-to-be graduates are the kids who voted for “sexy brilliance” in 2008.
I argued with a Liberal who informed me that Obama had created jobs during his tenure, and at the time the number of jobs created was argued to be around 508,000 jobs.[19] What my antagonist didn’t realize is the jobs Obama created had average salaries of $9 an hour. It’s no wonder that starting salaries for college graduates across the United States are down in 2010.
Don’t expect Liberals to inform you that there is now a 100 percent online university which costs substantially less, where teachers have to earn their pay and are not eligible for tenure. As the LA Times reported:
“Undergraduate students pay $2,800 per semester. That pays for as many or as few units as they can manage to take. The average graduate pays less than $15,000 for a four-year degree.”
That inexpensive degree may not guarantee that a graduate will have a job waiting after graduation, but she would have just as good an education, a lot less debt, and no pimp.
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Liberals are fishers of men. They are constantly testing baits. Take Obama’s proposed middle-class tax cut. Obama could care less about cutting taxes for the middle-class; it makes for a nice sound bite though.
Obama, like all good Liberals wants much more taxation of the middle-class than he will admit. Obama’s program is very simply a fishing expedition for the price it will take to buy the middle-class, while simultaneously redefining what middle-class really is. Redefining the middle-class is an absolute necessity, because expectations much be lowered.
Let me explain. $250K is now considered rich, and that’s for two people. So really $125K is considered rich for a single person, but not really. For some reason, the government takes an additional $10K off the definition of single and rich, reducing it to $115K. Don’t bother asking why. But as long as you stay below $115K, the government will allow you to keep most of your earnings.
What is sexy brilliant about Obama’s tax plan is it relied on the middle-class not recognizing that it’s their money Obama used as an inducement. According to this report from ABC news, one of the incentives Obama offered was a tax incentive on child care.
In a day when the average “working American” works through August for the government,[20] the least the government could do is take care of our kids. How else can we produce, if we can’t get somebody to care for our kids?
This tax incentive essentially would rebate part of your money to allow you to continue to work without the hindrance of your children. The incentive would be limited to people who make less than $115,000. $115K may be rich in Afghanistan; but in America, $115K won’t pay Paris Hilton’s monthly wardrobe budget.
Another “incentive” in Obama’s middle-class fishing trip was a $500 tax credit to match your 401(K) savings. What money is Obama planning to use to match your savings? Your money!
This strategy isn’t even the slightest bit clever. Government doesn’t create any money, though they can inflate it by printing more, something Obama has already done multiple times. Think about this in terms of your bank. Imagine the president of Bank of America sending you a note that says:
“Dear Patron, I would